The Moral Duty to Buy Health Insurance
Tina Rulli, David Wendler, and Ezekiel J. Emanuel discuss the Affordable Care Act for The Journal of the American Medical Association. They argue, “Because physicians and hospitals have a duty to rescue the uninsured by providing acute and emergency care, individuals have a corresponding duty to purchase insurance to cover the costs of this care.” Rulli, Wendler and Emanuel conclude that the “moral duty [to purchase insurance] provides grounds for an enforceable legal duty because the state has an interest in limiting individuals’ imposition of substantial burdens on others.”